THE IMPORTANCE OF UTILISING THE COMPANY VALUES
When you were simply a part of the team, the values of the business or company may have meant something to you, but often that’s not the case. However, when you become a people leader in the business, you are both a steward and a proponent of the values, and the use of them are also an effective leadership tool.
I have delivered leadership training in numerous businesses, particularly for frontline or emerging team leaders who often arrive at my workshops barely able to list all of the organisation’s values. There is often a degree of cynicism or simply indifference towards what appears to many to be “corporate speak”. Yet when we spend time considering the quality of the business’ values, there are very few that are opposed to them, and the vast majority believe that the more their team demonstrates them, the more the team will:
And who wouldn’t want to be part of a team where the factors listed above are the norm? In one of my workshops I had an ex-police officer who had shifted careers but still carried much of the mistrust that had helped him to do his job effectively as a member of the constabulary. When I suggested that the organisation’s values were not only really aspirational (caring, be straight up, delivering on promises), but leaders in the business could use them on a daily basis as targeted behaviour, he was seriously sceptical and believed that his team would find it really cheesy if he focussed on the “Values from head office”. I suggested that he try having a ‘Values Moment’ at each morning meeting where one of the company’s values were highlighted. Regardless of any initial push back, or lack of engagement, he needed to use the leadership characteristic of perseverance, and trial the practice for at least a couple of weeks, and preferably for the entire month in between leadership workshops. When he returned, I was eager to hear how he’d got on. He’d started off and faced the anticipated nonplussed response of the team but had persevered. The ‘light bulb’ moment came for him in the second or third week when he got to the end of one morning meeting and had forgotten to have a “Values Moment” and a member of the team had pulled him up, and said “Hey, we haven’t had our Values Moment yet, aren’t we doing them anymore?” It was at that point that he realised that not only was there appreciation for the values and the kind of culture that they inspired, but there was also an appetite to have the values discussed in a meaningful way in pursuit of better cultural and performance. Just because people appear not to be enthused or engaged, doesn’t mean that they won’t be tomorrow, or next week. Sometimes leaders need to persevere with ‘the right thing’ because it takes time for people to understand a new message, time to buy in, and time to build muscle memory for ‘the new’.
